There are very few hip-hop outfits that are as stylistically exciting as Outkast; they’ve proved this time and again since Antwon Patton and Andre Benjamin first teamed-up for 1991’s Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik. They really broke through though with Stankonia in 2000 and built on their popularity with 2003’s Speakerboxxx/The Love Below, which was carried on gossamer wings thanks to the phenomenon that was “Hey Ya”. Now, the long delayed Idlewild disc, which accompanies the movie of the same name, has hit the shelves, and while it’s a solid effort from the duo, it doesn’t exactly build on what’s come before, taking the music of Outkast to the next level.



Of course this is not a true Outkast album; it’s a soundtrack and a concept album rolled into one. There are several interludes that contain dialogue from the Idlewild movie. These really don’t do much other than stretch the album to 25 tracks and 78 minutes. As for the music, there is some pretty good stuff on this album, but a lot of it just really didn’t connect with me as a listener; it was passive and Outkast just shouldn’t be passive.



Most of Andre 3000’s tracks on the album are an ambitious fusion of modern hip-hop and R & B with classic jazz and swing. One of the gems is “PJ & Rooster”, which, if you’ve seen the Idlewild trailer, you’ve already heard part of. It’s almost a swing tune, but the vibe is modern and the mix is seamless. At once you see this playing in a club or back in the time of speakeasies and big bands, but the vision is always of people dancing wildly to the music. Other cool tunes from Andre include the hot jazz quickie “Makes No Sense at All” and the charmingly classical-sounding two-step “When I Look in Your Eyes”. Keeping things fresh is the blues-inspired “Idlewild Blue (Don’t Chu Worry ‘Bout Me)”, which is deceptively simple but subtle in nuance.



Big Boi is no slouch either, delivering solid hip-hop tunes with frequent collaborators Sleepy Brown and Scar. “The Train” has some serious soul and a great energy to it, while “Call the Law” punches up the beats with a swing and gospel blend and the wonderful vocals of Janelle Monae making a nice counter to Antwon’s. He then pushes the experiment further with “Mutron Angel”, which plays pretty close to straight-up gospel with a faux organ synth and electric guitar for accompaniment; he even hands over lead vocals to Whild Peach.



This is good stuff, but there are long stretches on the album between anything substantial and some compositional experiments are more successful than others. Then there are the songs where you think they aren’t even trying, but that may have something to do with having to hear the songs in the context of the movie. All-in-all, Idlewild kind of reminded me of Madonna’s accompanying album to Dick Tracy, I’m Breathless. It too had lofty ambitions of combining the jazz age with the dance age, but it also stumbled frequently between bouts of inspiration. I admire Outkast’s aspirations; they created a really funky album to be sure, but it unfortunately drags too much between the good stuff.